General Management

This report examines the area of corporate governance, with particular regard to the role of directorial independence. It assesses the relationship between such independence and corporate performance and attempts to provide suitable suggestions for the enhancement of board independence in order to improve corporate governance levels.

Corporate governance entails the ensuring of the conduct of organisational activities in a fair, ethical and lawful manner, with due consideration given to the legitimate rights and demands of all stakeholders.

A few decades ago, in the 1950s and the 1960s most UK residents bought their food and household items from greengrocers, fishmongers, butchers, food stores and markets. Today the overwhelming majority of such purchases in the UK, which have multiplied many times to cross 100 billion GBP, occur in supermarkets

Recent times have however seen the emergence of a number of models that challenge traditional concepts of leadership. Management experts state that whilst the concept of the manager as leader and individualist superhero has been widespread in SME and general business literature, such concepts are now being challenged and that opinion is building up not only on the need to discard such traditional stereotypes but to appreciate that business purposes are better served by shared leadership and collaborative business practices, which are widely distributed throughout organisations.

Even as tenets of capitalism were being adopted and progressively improved in Europe, the commencement of colonialist adventures in the 15th and 16th centuries by European powers led to the progressive colonisation of the Americas, Africa, and Asia over the next two centuries and probably to the darkest era ever witnessed by the world